WEST LINN, Ore. (KATU) — One of Oregon’s claims to fame is the Willamette, the largest meteorite found in the U.S. Long before a farmer found it near West Linn, Ore., in 1902, the indigenous Clackamas people revered the meteorite as a healer sent to lend them strength.
A visitor from the sky
Thousands of years ago, the iron-nickel meteorite hurtled through the Earth’s atmosphere and crashed in present-day Montana. Glacial melt of the Missoula Floods carried the 15.5-ton (that’s 34,200 pounds) visitor to the Willamette Valley. From then on, it resided with the Clackamas people, who called it Tomanowos, meaning “spirit power.”
“Tomanowos was a traveler, a spirit sent to us,” said Cheryle Kennedy, the Chairwoman of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde.
The Clackamas people would gather around the meteorite and conduct a ceremony. They would dip their arrowheads in the rainwater that gathered in the indentations of the meteor for help with hunting. This spiritual relationship persisted through significant hardship.
“It has been a long, treacherous journey,” Chairwoman Kennedy shared…